Category Archives: 02.2013

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it was midnight in this revolution of my heart. i fell asleep on the bus ride home and woke up at nine mile station, middle of nowhere, and realized that this nap that sucked me into angelic dreams and dreary lucid mental orgasm was nothing more than a sad escape from reality. i pulled down the blinds over my eyes, turned out the lights in my brain, i threw all the clutter from off the floors and tucked it under the bed of my heart and i just sat for hours and hours listening to “let it be” on repeat staring at the white white white white ceiling of my skull.

let it be. let it be. let it be. it all did amount to nothing. a few dozen scraps of poems on the floor with dust and neglected bills, empty bottles of pills, half empty bottles of booze. i couldn’t even commit to alcoholism.

it was cold. i was at a bus stop. my phone was dead. the twenty-four hour grocery store was closed, and the snow was pouring down like i was stuck in a dry erase board and this magic eraser was quickly deleting my stick figure limbs. the bus driver was gone. careless to the fact that i was faced with stalemate at parker and peoria.

but really i was at the crossroads of adulthood and childhood. where the crayon coloring on the walls scrolled along like stock market tickers. where bouncy balls were filled with the hot air of politicians. where the seesaw wobbled up and down like somewhat productive half-baked socially progressive arguments about race, gender, sexuality, all leading to the inevitable conclusion that we needed to learn how to look at each other as individuals.

but what from there? practice what you preach, but what if you’re an atheist? how do you learn to dance like yourself when you’ve been inflicted with the awkward steps of society? how do you fly a plane when the gravity of the responsibility of love keeps you grounded?

we are expecting bad weather nationwide. internationwide. universally. exponentially. galaxically. i have got to stop making up words. i have got to stop drunk texting my invisible friends in the middle of the night.

i’m buried in snow.

it’s metaphorical snow. did i establish that? i’m sorry. am i breaking the fourth wall? am i breaking the fifth wall if i say i know you get sad sometimes? am i throwing a rock through your precious painted christmastime window? i’m sorry if i ruined the little mermaid for you by analyzing my insane quandry that the disneyverse is just the bible with more colors. is that true? i sound like a crazy person. you sound like a crazy person. we sound like a crazy person.

when i need something to grasp onto i hold your hand. in my head. i take us to the movies and i stare stare stare at the screen. i’ve become tainted by the fact i’m a writer. all i can do is tear apart the character motives and the necessity of certain dialogues. i have been invited into someone’s dream and all i can do is mock their wallpaper and tell them the proper way to entertain their guests. i am the king of cocktail parties

that nobody would want to go to.

but right now, i am bundled at a bus stop. in bum fuck egypt. in the middle of the night. in colorado. on this third rock from the sun. our sun. our holy holy sun that just belongs to me, not you. and it’s taken this. it’s taken all this to remind me

that all i have to do

is point to the sky

choose a star

and walk towards it

until i find myself beneath it

then take the next elevator into space

where hopefully my love is waiting for me

and if she’s not

i’ll deal

because sometimes the best life is lived alone, but only if alone means to you that you never find someone to get stuck on a ferris wheel with and kiss until your mouths are sore. down below your friends are waiting for you.

entrapment is the shiny love that takes you away from all your other loves.

be careful.

carry pepper spray and a strong argument.

box without gloves and ride life bareback.

always have at least two quarters in that tiny little pocket in your jeans.

tattoo your name on your palm, and wear it like an indian headdress.

tread softly and carry a big heart.

happy february,

(brice.)

COPYRIGHT BRICE MAIURRO 2013

02.2013 is a twenty-eight day project chronicling my february of 2013 through poetry. to read the entries from the beginning CLICK HERE

when you said you liked the beatles
the oxygenless night exploded into day
the grey clouds were wiped from the sky
like billows of white from a chalkboard
your eyes lit up like a thousand suns
into the reflection of my radioactive moonlight
and we eclipsed into the caverns of love

when you said you liked the beatles
i could feel my heart growing like bamboo
on steroids into the hollows of my arms
and overwhelmed my body began to sing
a duet with you laced with great hope
a great hope in the divine and that the heavens
weren’t just those blue squigglies above
the red house and the brown dog in a child’s drawing
on a fridge

when you said you liked the beatles
i became filled with a rage of joy
something i didn’t think possible
i found myself dancing through lines
at the d.m.v. and driving one hundred mph
into the mountains to go find the heart
that i now knew was still beating

when you said you liked the beatles
fantastic wings sprouted from your back
and i began to paint an electric portrait of you
psychedelic and visceral and honest to the aura
you possess inside your home of a house

when you said you liked the beatles
i fell in love with you
as we danced to something
pouring out of the loudspeakers
in the streets of denver
like crystalline drops of water
that have resonated eternally
through the last fifty years
and will continue to resonate
forever ever into the cosmos
and where the walls of time
fold in onto themselves and
everyone loves the beatles
the beatles are everyone’s band
but when you said you loved the beatles
i remembered there are such things
in this world that exist that we all feel
that will never be captured
that do not drown in the sands of an hourglass
but form great glasshouses
immune to any stones you could throw

they just remain
in the minds
and the hearts
and the guts
of the mass populace
of incredible lovely people
forever ever into the cosmos
and where the walls of time
fold in onto themselves
like the crescendo
in the middle of
a day in the life

there’s a dead deer on the highway of our love
there’s a man in a business suit pretending to be me
there’s a goldfish that lives in my water bottle
there’s a music box ballerina that lives in my glove compartment
there’s daggers falling from the ceiling
and i’m a six year old thinking i can save my self
by hiding underneath my teenage mutant ninja turtle blanket
there’s no room for your family in the lifeboat of our trust

there’s a fly stuck in my skull
and he is driving me up the fucking wall
he is buzzing and buzzing and every hour
i am that much more tempted to just crack my head open
and let the mother fucker out
there are no presidents in narnia or wonderland or heaven
or hell or the matrix inside of my skull
just this god damn fly who is still buzzing
you sound like a mother
do you know that fly?
you keep nagging like a mother
there’s an escaped insane asylum inmate driving the bus
and we’re all going wherever his fancy takes us

there’s ten thumbs where i should have fingers
there’s two left feet where i should have a right one
there’s devils doing angel dust in casino bathrooms
there’s a train station in my heart that’s been closed
for a long, long time and high school kids just sneak there
on friday and saturday nights to get high and make out
there’s crocodiles in the sewer of my bloodstream

nothing is pretty right now and nothing is disney
nothing is saturday morning cartoons
nothing is mister roger’s neighborhood
nothing is monday through friday, nine a.m. to five p.m.
nothing is candygram
nothing is dinner with the family
american steak and american potatoes and coca cola
but not for the kids because no caffeine this late
nothing is that
it’s just a mess up there in my head right now
kurt vonnegut breakfast of champions schizo hodgepodge
there’s some godless hippy waiving an anti-this sign
and he has a point but he hasn’t filled the hole he’s dug
he’s ran onto the stage of my skull
and disbanded the magic trick
but he didn’t put anything in its place
he’s just standing there
like a frickin crack addict on stage
smiling like a moron at the audience
now he’s dancing like the w.b. frog

hello my baby
hello my darling
hello my ragtime gal

goodbye nightmare
hello dream

there’s spare change rattling around my stomach
there’s a faceless image of god on the skin of my eyes
and the television is the best listener i’ve run into
except you, you never seem to say much either

everything i’ve ever known
says i should dismiss you
as a silly capitalistic hub
but i can’t do that
i have known you for far too long
when i was a kid
we would visit you

there’s a strange fondness i feel
for the days i would spend hours suffering
beneath the toxic bright lights of the limited too
while my mom and sister shuffled endlessly
through the mass-produced neon clothes

there’s a strange fondness i feel
for pacing around the mall
with my pink-haired freshman girlfriend
hand-in-hand
eating a cherry-dipped dairy queen cone
and watching the kiosk employee
flying his plastic helicopter
by remote control
in the atrium of the mall

there’s a certain fondness i feel
about sneaking into spencer’s gift with friends
and pretending we weren’t just going
to laugh at the sex toys

you are not that impressive
and you never have been
but i have heard the muzak dying
i have watched
as stores with pulses
became white walls
you cannot lie to me
i can hear the heartbeat behind the plaster

your gold chandeliers have fallen
my sweet, sweet grandmother of a mall
we used to visit more often
but now we’ve just thrown you into a nursing home
and watched you suffer from a ghost town complex

there’s a strange fondness i feel
for the foreign workers at the sunglass stands
their cheeseball slicked back hair
and their desperation to sell you
overpriced sunglasses
you infected them with that desperation

it is never easy
to watch the past
slowly implode on itself

there’s a strange fondness i feel
to know that my father
a shoe salesman
paced daily so many times
by my mom’s work
before he had the courage
to ask her on a date
within you

the love that made me
the love that raised me
was born inside of you

some things don’t go slowly
and sentiment is a strange bird
that lands on whatever perch it cares to

you’re dying before my eyes
and i’m learning now
that you cannot mourn
what you’ve yet to lose

stella
oh, my baby, stella
you are the one that i cradle in my arms
when we can’t pay the rent
when the landlord is banging at the door
in the starlit night we just sit
on my alabama porch
and i count the stars like pennies
and you sing me a twelve bar song

stella
oh, my baby, stella
your curves were made with intention
i met you at a pawn shop
and as soon as i saw you
pressed up against the wall
i knew i would give
a twenty-dollar gold piece
right off my watch cahin
just to have you

and you came on home with me
in the dark, dark mississippi night
and we stayed up
through the blackest of
black georgia twilight
and we talked about your skin
we laughed about the cost of everything
and i put my hand on your neck
and you took my other hand
and you pointed it up towards the north star

you spoke in rhythm
that was not lost on me
everything i said
you said right back to me
but with poetry
like an old blues song
grown from the deep south of your love

your fingertips like work songs
your field drab lips like field hollers
your wide, wide hips like spirituals

stella
oh, my baby, stella
i take you with me everywhere i go
together we’re safe from the black rum booze
together we’re safe from these blue devil blues
when i play you like a guitar
you play me right back
and i love you for it
oh, my baby, stella
i love you for it

COPYRIGHT BRICE MAIURRO 2013

02.2013 is a twenty-eight day project chronicling my february of 2013 through poetry. to read the entries from the beginning CLICK HERE

i woke up
and out my window
were the dusty chinese lamps of chinatown
mount fuji
off in the distance
covered with the snows of kilimanjaro
cold and ancient
i found myself in a foreign land
where the night cafes were open until dawn
the city glowing in the rain

the dusty roads leading to neon casinos
and water clear enough to see to the bottom
there was an identity to this place
though i didn’t know what it was
maybe a western mindset of eastern philosophy
there was something about the way
the snow covered the ground
like the weather wast trying to tell us
we can start over if we want to
or we could just throw all the cats in a bag
and shake it up

i began to feel sea sick
it was as if the palm trees in the distance\
were swaying with me
to the acoustic ringing of polynesian ukulele
and the old, old buildings crumbled
like pixels of my sanity

when in rome, they say,
do as the romans do

so i went down
to fisherman’s wharf
and i rented myself a fixie
and i rode it through the winding streets
the narrow dark back alleyways
over the grassy knolls
and down martin luther king blvd.
and when i felt burnt out
i retired in the night to a pizza parlor
this city really does never sleep
it’s so big
and there’s just months of sunlights
and months of night

to think slaves made these pyramids
it was so damn cold
and i was stuck in bermuda shorts
lost in the cocaine triangle of denver

i could barely see across this wide wide river
full of caymans and pirahnas, the fish and flauna
and memories of you
you
lost on some distant star of a planet

i wish you were here
we could go see the savage matadors
murdering the innocent bulls

i wish you were here
i guess technically you are

it seems everyone speaks their own language here
the oceans are so blue
the grass is so green
the continents all fit together so nicely
like those hotel rooms
with nothing between each other
but locked doors

you leave me sore on the everywhere
you kiss the wound with salt on the rim
you go through men like a chain smoker
you exit the building like you committed a murder
but when you enter
you come crawling across the floor of my bedroom
forever the etiquette of anger
forever the etiquette of anger

SORRY FOR NOT POSTING FOR SEVERAL DAYS AGAIN, GUYS. SOMETIMES LIFE JUST HAPPENS AND I DON’T HAVE TIME TO SIT DOWN AND TYPE. I’M HOPING TO GET CAUGHT UP OVER THE NEXT COUPLE DAYS POSTING THE POEMS I’VE BEEN WRITING

(lifetime achievement award.)

thinking about
every single yes
i said no to

what the hell
just take the gifts of the night
and set them on fire
good work, kid
your integrity challenges me
your character is something
i can only aspire to
you stupid coward
you are afraid of being happy
you
are the something in the way
kurt cobain jr.

we were sitting on the swings at a park in the aftermath of a snowstorm. you asked me if i had any cigarettes and i told you no. i don’t know how many times i’ve told you i don’t smoke and i don’t have any cigarettes, but it never seems to strike a chord with you, and i guess i get that. smokers have a certain sick sad desperation to their vice. wow, that sounds redundant. what i’m trying to say is despite the insurmountable odds that i don’t have a cigarette, you still always ask me if i do. maybe it’s not desperation. maybe it’s hope. faith in what is most likely not true.

you were glowing. you were always one of those girls who made sense bundled up in the middle of colorado winter. your cheeks looked good with a little extra red to them.

“that’s okay,” you said about the cigarette, “because i have this invisible cigarette.”

you spared no artistic expense with this. you reached into your jacket and pulled out an invisible package of cigarettes. you pulled out one cigarette.

“phew. last one.” you said, “unless you want one, in which case i have one more?”

“no, i’m good,” i said. you looked a little disappointed.

you put the invisible box back in your jacket and swinging a little you pulled out an invisible lighter. i watched you actually inhale. you were smiling. one of those good smiles. one of those true smiles that wasn’t based on some social situation that makes you feel obliged to smile. you were experiencing actual joy, sitting in that park, freezing our asses off.

and then for the high point of your performance, you blew out cold air, and i swear to god, you somehow made it billow like actual smoke.

“very well played,” i said.

“thank you, thank you,” you threw your fake cigarette onto the ground, “fake cigarettes aren’t the same though. they don’t have any sense of danger to them. you don’t feel any fire in your lungs,”

“i wouldn’t know. i’ve never smoked,” i said.

“yes, you have,”

“no. no i have not,”

“you’re a fucking liar,” you said, “i distinctly remember last time we were drunk in denver, you were chain-smoking,”

“i don’t remember this at all, so clearly it never happened,” i said.

“you are a liar,”

“why are we out in this?” i asked.

“because we both are twenty-four and living at home,”

“yeah, i didn’t see that one coming,” i said.

“you have nothing to be ashamed of,” you said to me, in that sympathetic way you say everything, “you are just in limbo between places,”

“i guess that’s true,”

“i, on the other hand, am a bum,”

“no, you’re not.”

my sympathy didn’t sound as good as yours.

“yeah, i kind of am. rich parents are a blessing and a curse. the blessing is they show their affection towards you through money, the curse is the same,”

“your parents love you,”

“i’m not denying that. some days it just feels like their world is moving too fast and sometimes it’s a dry cleaning ticket that gets lost in the madness, or a pair of car keys, but sometimes it’s me,”

i don’t think you, or most people for that matter, realize how often they talk in poetry.

“wanna make out?” i asked, smiling some deadbeat frozen smile.

“you’re funny,” you said, but i wasn’t trying to be funny. maybe it was a poor word choice on my part, or maybe we were just gonna keep on living in this land of indecision. maybe we’re destined to swing back and forth together in this white nothingness at some time between night and morning.